This is my first time posting. I have been married 8 years and have just discovered Dr. Harley's books and this website. The concept of POJA intrigues me, as my husband and I have definitely NOT been using it and I wonder if we'd be getting along better if we applied it. I have been wondering, how does the POJA jive with wives submitting to their husbands? (Ephesians 5:22, 1 Peter 3:1) Anyone know what Dr. Harley's stance is on wives submitting?

So, to use one our many ongoing disagreements as an example, say husband wants to get a dog and wife doesn't. Should husband concede out of love for his wife's wishes, or should wife submit to his position of authority? Or both?

If you can't tell, both my husband and I are pretty strong-willed, but want to live out our marriage God's way, so this topic is of great interest to me!

Welcome to MB.

Here are some good articles. Tell us what you think.
How the Co-dependency Movement Is Ruining Marriages.
What's Wrong with Unconditional Love? (Part 1)

You can listen to these interviews where Dr. Harley discusses marriages in accordance with Biblical standards:

Nice job Jedi!!!

Dr Harley is a theologian and he makes the case that married couples should "submit to one another." He takes ALL of the scriptures together instead of taking one and setting it apart to come to this conclusion. Submitting to one spouse at the expense of the other is what leads to incompatible marriages. He has discussed this extensively on the radio. I will look for it and post it if I can find it.

Dr harley writes:

"I'll illustrate that point with my cardinal rule of marriage, the Policy of Joint Agreement: Never do anything without an enthusiastic agreement between you and your spouse. That rule focuses on mutual respect and consideration in marriage. Differences in physical strength, earning power, and even intelligence do not alter the equation. Power is granted to both spouses equally. But the default condition, doing nothing, would be a disaster if that became the norm. For a marriage to succeed, agreement must be found, and that's where personal choice comes into the equation. It's assumed that both spouses are able to express their perspectives to each other, and to negotiate an outcome that works to the advantage of both. They are at liberty to do whatever works for both of them. Doing nothing ruins both of their lives.

When you decide to follow the Policy of Joint Agreement, you are giving each other equal power in your marriage. Neither of you can force the other to do anything, or to put up with anything either of you decides to do. Your choices must work for both of you or you don't make them. With enthusiastic agreement as your goal with every conflict, you will learn to appreciate the differences in perspective that you bring to the issue. You will try to gain a better understanding to the vast differences in the way you both think and reason. It's only then that you'll be able to see what works best for each other, instead of trying to force your own way of thinking on each other.

That's why marital problem-solving requires mutual respect and understanding. Trying to demand compliance, or showing disrespect for your spouse's alternative point of view, or deciding to go it alone, making an independent choice, leads to marital failure. But it does more than that. It prevents you from coming to know an entirely different kind of person, someone not at all like you. It's someone who can make your understanding of the world much more complete if you regard that person as an equal, and show your profound respect for what he or she has to offer you in wisdom and support."

Please read the full article: Why are the differences between a man and a woman so valuable in marriage?

Here's a good radio show on "submission in marriage".
Radio Clip on Submission in Marriage
Segment #2

This subject troubled me for awhile. I couldn't see how MB squared away with what I had always been taught about submission and the wife's role. That is, until I went back and read the original scripture that the teaching of "biblical submission" is based on.

That's where we usually stop. But there's more.


Biblical submission is not the wife doing whatever her husband wants her to do. True Biblical submission and the POJA are essentially the same thing, when you look at these verses.

POJA: Never do anything without the enthusiastic agreement of your spouse.
The wife's submission, according to Ephesians: Respect your husband and care for him by not putting your own desires above his
The husband's role, according to Ephesians: Love your wife as you love your own body, give yourself up for her, care for her

The wife submits to her husband by taking his feelings into account and never doing anything that he is not enthusiastic about. The husband loves and cares for his wife by considering her feelings and desires equal to his own, and never doing anything that she is not enthusiastic about. If he is to love her as his own body, how is he to force her to do something she hates?

To answer your question, a husband who loves his wife as himself would not force a dog on her that she does not want.

So this is the husband of "Prookatz" (the guy who wants the dog )
Of course I am not going to try to make my wife get a dog and try to use the whole submission thing as my power play- that would obviously be a misuse of authority, and a misuse of Scripture.

Also, all of you seem to be very well-meaning and intelligent folks.

So with those two prefaces made, I am a little surprised that no one has stated the obvious: the writer of Ephesians 5 makes a special point of admonishing wives to "submit to their husbands as to the Lord," and going on to say "Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything." The writer of Ephesians places special emphasis on the wife submitting to the husband and not the other way around. His point in ephesians 5 is that as the church submits to Christ, so wives ought to submit to their husbands. I do not think Christ submits/obeys the church, does he? Christ sacrifices himself for the sake of the church, but he does not obey the church. Rather, the church obeys him.
My point is that Ephesians 5 teaches that men and women have different roles, and those roles have to do with an authority structure. To put it more bluntly, Paul makes it pretty clear that men are in authority.
I feel frustrated when folks try to ignore this or gloss over it by pointing to the "submit to one another" verse, as though that nullifies what the writer of Ephesians says later on.
I am not saying that the husband is not to sacrifice his own desires and welfare for the sake of his wife, I am merely saying that Ephesians is definitely saying something about male authority here.
If folks want to say that they disagree with ephesians, that would be more intellectually honest. If they want to say that Paul taught these ideas in a culture different than ours and therefore what he said is not relevant to our culture (like head coverings, etc) then that may be a valid (though precarious) argument. But to pretend Paul says nothing about authority here is not honest with the text.
It possible that if the husband obeyed this passage perfectly, and the wife obeyed this passage perfectly, that the end result would look something like POJA. But that does not mean that it is not important to read Ephesians 5 for what it really says: that just as Christ is in authority over the church, so husbands are in authority over their wives.
Those are my thoughts...and I could have been walking my dog all this time...if i had a dog...sniff sniff

Husband of Prookatz, I Peter 3:7-8 goes on to say that husbands must in the same way treat their wives with respect as the weaker partner (physically) and as heirs with you so that nothing will hinder your prayers.

The husband's number one priority Biblically is to be a learner of his wife. To study her, and find out what makes her tick.

You both are heirs in unity though marriage. Would your getting a dog against your wife's wishes be the sort of thing that Paul intended when he mentioned husbands having authority in the marriage?

That is probably why no one has stated the obvious. We could also go on to quote verses that speak to the role of animals to the children of God. But we won't, because the whole submission thing as a way to get a dog is, as you say, a mis-use of authority. AND against POJA.

Great topic though!

This is pretty interesting conversation, and I'm finding the Bible verses interesting.


They are doing all this amazing stuff, but you are advocating for trying to gain at your wife's expense.

As an aside, I remember when my marriage was troubled, fully in State of Conflict with Renter's agreement on both sides. That false idea that "I earned your sacrifice through my sacrifice." I went along with getting a dog, and my ex, though he was the one who pushed for it, never bonded with it. I took care of her as best as I could for as long as I could. I would love for you to have a different life, with the Buyer's agreement, the idea that you and your wife can work together to find solutions that make you both happy.

There are isolated instances where obeying is necessary, like in Genesis 19:19-26 when God sends angels to rescue Lot and his family, and they are told not to look back. Lot's wife looked back, and became a pillar of salt. But this situation is nothing like that, you have the rest of your lives to figure out what kinds of pets you want if any at all.

I'm glad you are posting here and asking questions. Many of us also struggled to come to grips with how the POJA and the "wives' submission and husbands' unconditional love" work together. Are those following the POJA in disobedience to God for not submitting and loving unconditionally?

In previous times, when women were more like chattel, if the husband wanted his own way, women often had no choice in the matter. She could have spit fire and argued and been demanding or she could have withdrawn from him and withheld sex or something like that. The writer seems to be telling women that neither of these two options were what the Lord desired. He wants us to live in harmony with one another, and in the case of a husband who demands his own way, then women were told they ought to submit to their own husbands.

Look at these two verses from 1 Peter:
1 - 2 Wives, in the same way submit yourselves to your own husbands so that, if any of them do not believe the word, they may be won over without words by the behavior of their wives, 2when they see the purity and reverence of your lives.

The believer wife is to submit to her husband when he is an unbeliever or disobedient to the Lord. This is to win him to the Lord.

And the same for husbands. If a man married a woman who for whatever reason turned out not to be a good wife, the law allowed him to divorce her, but the writer admonished men to love their wives instead.

1 Peter goes on in verse 7: "Husbands, in the same way be considerate as you live with your wives, and treat them with respect as the weaker partner and as heirs with you of the gracious gift of life, so that nothing will hinder your prayers."

Women are co-heirs with men in the kingdom of heaven. We are equal in the eyes of God.

But there's more:

When God first created marriage, He designed it as a relationship of unity. Eve was the perfect counterpart to Adam; she wasn't his "helper" or his "assistant" in the way we define those words now. The root of that particular Hebrew word was used about 80 times in the Old Testament, generally of military aid, help from a position of strength or supply. (Studylight.org) From other sources, this word is also used to describe the Holy Spirit.

Eve was everything that Adam was not. Together, they formed the whole. God designed the man and woman to correspond to each other perfectly. Each has strengths and weaknesses that the other compensates for. They were to be one flesh. There is no mention of having placed Adam in charge or in a superior position over Eve. They were cleaved together and in unity and beautifully mutually interdependent.

When Eve was deceived by Satan and sinned, and Adam, then knowing exactly what he was doing, also sinned, the marital relationship, and all subsequent marital relationships, suffered the effects of sin. "Your desire will be for your husband, but he will rule over you" describes the tragic effects of sin on their relationship. Wives and husbands would forever vie for control.

Proceeding to the New Testament letters, such as Ephesians, that say we should submit to one another, a woman should submit to her husband as the church submits to Christ, and a man should love his wife as Christ loved the church and laid down His life for her:

1.) When a woman is told to submit to and respect her husband, does this seem to imply that she should not also love him? In Titus, older woman are urged to teach the younger women to love their husbands and their children. So it would seem that we are to do both - respect/submit AND love.

2.) When a man is told to love his wife, does this seem to imply that he should not also submit to and respect her? Is he to submit to everyone else, except for his wife?

Remember we have to take these phrases in context. In another place, the submission passages are written within a series of statements of how slaves are to submit willingly to their masters, that subjects are to submit to the ruling authorities, etc. The idea, I believe, is to live in harmony and peace with others, including our spouses. "Outsiders" should never see proclaimed Christians fighting and out of harmony with each other. Conflict is inevitable, but we can handle it with respect.

In today's world, woman want to be equal partners with their husbands. They don't want to be ruled over. They want equal say in the decisions. In a Christian marriage, we ought not to be arguing and fighting over these decisions. (Actually in no marriage should this be happening, because it destroys love and doesn't solve the problem anyway.) Rather, we should each work together in calm respectful negotiations to reach a decision that makes both spouses happy. We have found it to be a wonderful way to live life together. We are each submitting to the other. We each hold the other accountable. We are making decisions that we both really like, and that is one of the reasons we are in love today.

Let's go back to how God created man and woman so differently but in a way that each complements and completes the other. When each perspective is taken into account, a better decision is usually reached. Even if the decision turns out to a bad one, such as an investment or job decision gone bad, since both spouses fully and enthusiastically agreed to the decision, there is no blame. You just kind of shrug your shoulders, learn from the experience, and move on. If only the husband is making the decisions, especially if he ignores his wife's perspectives, he will bear all the blame for the decision. And vice versa, of course.

My H and I have lived both ways: submission on my part to a man who was disobedient to God. It made me rely on the Lord but my marriage caused me a great deal of extreme unhappiness. We have lived in our "new" Marriage Builder marriage for the last three-plus years, and these have been the most successful and happiest years of our marriage. We are in love with each other, we help each other, and make all our decisions so that we are BOTH happy. Our marriage is now a blessing to BOTH of us.

I struggled with what God wanted my role to be in the case of a husband who was not leading for our mutual welfare as shown by his outbursts and other self centered behaviors.

After 25 years of much prayer and a long spiritual struggle as I sought God's will for my marriage, I came to realize that there are conditions to the husband's leadership in the Bible as well as get a better understanding of what the role of the "led" is.

First of all, "led" does not mean subjugated. Secondly, all of the verses in Proverbs about what to do with an angry man, and in Psalms and Proverbs about scoffers and fools do NOT say "unless he is your husband". No, the "led" is to respect herself with the boundaries the Bible prescribes (do not be in the company of an angry man, do not sit with mockers, etc etc). Thirdly, the "leader" is accountable to the "led" to lead to mutual benefit and not to destruction (II Cor 10:8). Finally, leadership is not to be used as a cloak of maliciousness. Study 1 Peter as to the whole character of a leader. Nothing of 1 Peter mirrors a heavy handed husband, but is more of a recipe of what Dr. Harley calls POJA.

Finally, in the several cases Bible outright states "wives, submit to your husbands", it has context as to what the husband is to do or how to protect the wife.

The whole idea of "Biblical submission" focuses on all of the ways the wife is to submit, but by its very title omits the responsibility of the man. It is more aptly titled "marital submission accordin to the Bible".

Finally, no where does the Bible instruct the husband that he is to ENFORCE the wife's submission. That statement is for the wife, not the husband.

But a woman does submit in PoJA. She never overrules her husband. She speaks and communicates with him respectfully. Most importantly of all she will never commit unsanctioned Independent Behaviour. She will never wave away his wishes or treat them as silly. If she can gives what he asks for honestly and with an enthusiastic heart, she does. If what he asks for she is not able to enthusiastically and honestly give, she tells him so, trusting he will not push for the unrealistic and unsustainable solution now he has been informed of her feelings.



Dr H would agree. Men don't have more power (I like the way you use the phrase 'abuse of authority') but they have more responsibility. He constantly tells men to lead the way in relationships. He never tells women to do so. If they are not being cared for effectively and proactively he tells women to leave. Men on the other hand have to conquer by working harder at the relationship. Working harder to care for their wives. The life of a leader is not an easy one in which you can dictate. Having gotten the yes vote you desire in the proposal you have to work tirelessly to keep your promises or you get voted out.



I am not even vaguely religious and so have no interest in reconciling a bible verse with MB. It makes little difference to me and if it was worlds apart, I'd say so.

It's uncannily similar though. The phrases 'as one flesh' and 'in the same way' portray that the husband and wife have an equal responsibility to each other. The terms and descriptions however convey that their responsibility is different to each other's. The wife, in submitting to her husband shows respect - Dr H teaches that men desire women to be proud of them and admire them. However the H in making sure he treats his wife's feelings as though they were his own provides love. Feeling cared for and protected is affection, which Dr H ayes is commonly a female need.

Dr H doesn't make men and women out to be the same and he places an unequal share of the burden on men's shoulders because he realises this is how we are wired.

If you read his article on the differences between men and women you will see what I mean.

He also acknowledges men's desire to be respected as a leader as long as they appreciate that their leadership style should be caring - which PoJA ensures. One man who was dead set on calling the shots came to realise that PoJA only constrained him from solutions that would make his wife unhappy. But it had the upshot of making sure she never overruled him or made him unhappy.

He gladly took on the policy and Dr H said his leadership changed overnight from that of a diktat to a " benevolent dictator". He still believed in his leadership but never implemented unpoja'd solutions his wife objected to.

Prookatz's husband again:
submission issue aside, the dog issue was just an example of my wife and I trying to figure out how to apply the policy of mutual enthusiastic agreement to our marriage. I have a hard time seeing it work. For instance, if I love dogs and want one, and my wife cannot stand dogs, then how would we come to a place where we enthusiastically agree? So far, it is either I win and get a dog and she loses because she doesnt like the furry creatures, or we dont get a dog and i lose. I have a hard time seeing how both of us can win. Again, the dog thing is just one example out of many in which we constantly butt heads. Ive read much of the He wins She wins book and still cannot wrap my head around how it is supposed to work. He writes about how instead of sacrificing for the other, with one person losing and the other winning, we should find a way to enthusiastically agree. Any ideas? Just to use the dog as an example?
thanks

You should look up the difference in type A and type B resentment. Going without something doesn't cause much resentment. Having to endure something does.

Your wife would be constantly tripping over, smelling, caring for, being jumped on by something she did not OK. Apply the same logic to something you couldn't endure. The house filled with your least favourite smell. Having to eat your least favourite cuisine, having to suffer your least favourite activity.

Enduring is a constant reminder that your spouse doesn't give a fig about your feelings. Going without only leaves a blank. Great! Within that blank leaves a million possibilities that could make you just as happy as your original idea.

Perhaps your wife would enthusiastically approve your volunteering with dogs. Or a smaller type of pet. Or a trial in which you do your utmost to make the plan work for her, show her what she could benefit from a dog. But with the caveat that if it simply doesn't work for her you drop the plan no hard feelings.

Even if you are just left with the blank that is better than creating a big seething mass of resentment and bringing a living thing into a home where it isn't truly wanted. You would be no more happy with a neglected dog and resentful wife than she would be. She is helpfully pointing out that this is the flaw in your plan.

When you marry it is though your hands are tied together. All your decisions have to fit you both, like a massive couples sized overcoat, as though you were truly one flesh. You wouldn't consider it 'losing' if you passed on the opportunity to buy an ill fitting coat.

Any decision that only fits one half of you is an ill fitting coat. Discard it and come up with a better plan.

You could volunteer at an animal shelter.

Imagine it like this: you are telepathic with your wife. Any resentment or pain she feels, you feel it right alongside her.

That would make you both motivated to come up with a plan that caused resentment to no one, yes?

No one vows to get a dog, or see the ballet, or eat Chinese food when they get married. They vow to show extraordinary care to one another. So everything else can be safely turfed out and done without. If it was as important as your marriage it would have featured in your vows.

Here is a thread you may find of interest reading:
http://forum.marriagebuilders.com/ubbt/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=1379231#Post1379231

(husband here) I am not sure I have ever heard of different types of resentment (type A/B). where did you hear that? is it something the doc talks about?